


make a stand (show your hand)

by anonemone



Category: Iron Man (Movies), Iron Man - All Media Types, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Pacific Rim Fusion, Gen, Shippy if you Squint, The Brass, The Drift (Pacific Rim), and the author's lack of any sort of military knowledge, dubious naming conventions, unsafe engineering practices
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-14
Updated: 2016-07-14
Packaged: 2018-07-23 22:46:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,118
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7482864
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anonemone/pseuds/anonemone
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jim is stationed in Kuwait when Manila happens. It would be another year and two more Kaiju attacks before it is called K-Day. For now, it’s just the Tragedy of Manila—a horrible catastrophe, to be sure, but a singular one, a freak accident.</p><p>The entire base watches the screens as the nuke is dropped on the city, and Jim couldn’t help the feeling that this is just the start of the war.</p>
            </blockquote>





	make a stand (show your hand)

**Author's Note:**

> Messed around with the timelines, so Tony and Rhodey are like really young here; mid-to-late twenties, maybe?. Also, Rhodey is somehow second Lieutenant but already the liaison to Stark Industries. Just... roll with it.

Jim is stationed in Kuwait when Manila happens. It would be another year and two more Kaiju attacks before it is called K-Day. For now, it’s just the Tragedy of Manila—a horrible catastrophe, to be sure, but a singular one, a freak accident.

The entire base watches the screens as the nuke is dropped on the city, and Jim couldn’t help the feeling that this is just the start of the war.

***

He’s still in Kuwait when the world’s predictions come true. One is an accident, two is a coincidence, three is a pattern. The third Kaiju attack hits California.

Jim throws caution (and, quite possibly, his military career) to the wind and all but begs his CO to let him fly out to California. He puts forward a good case about being the SI liaison and the importance of SI to the defense effort _._  He tries (and fails) to maintain a cool façade, tries (and fails) to not think about the fact that he can be there, evacuating Stark Industries himself (get Happy, Pepper,  _Tony_ ).

And then a giant red and gold robot comes out from the basement of the Stark Industries compound and punches the damn Kaiju, and he knows he was worried about Tony for the completely wrong reason.

***

In the end he does get his orders to go to the California base because everyone’s at a loss about how to deal with Tony Stark and his giant Kaiju-fighting robot (which he apparently piloted from  _inside_  the damn thing and Jim is so ready to give him an earful about that because the guy can build a giant metal suit secretly in his—admittedly huge and well-stocked—basement but he can’t add remote piloting capabilities? Bullshit).

Said man is waiting for him at the hangar, bouncing with energy for all that he is covered in bruises and has his arm in a sling and has just defeated a Kaiju singlehandedly by piloting a giant robot.

“Rhodeybear!” Tony makes his best attempt at a one-armed full-body hug. “I’m calling it Jaeger; German enough to piss off dad, don’t you think? Of course, the media is calling it Iron Man or something, despite the fact that basically none of it is iron—it’s mostly this gold-titanium alloy, very lightweight and strong, fantastic stuff—do they really think I’ll use something as rust-prone and heavy as iron in a machine meant to fight against giant aliens from the sea? I weep for the state of engineering. Good thing we’re here to help the world, huh?”

Jim has long learned that the best response to a Tony Stark high on adrenaline and the sound of his own voice is to let him say his piece because it’s impossible to get a word in otherwise. He’s also learned that asking the guy outright if he’s fine is just asking for a bullshit answer. “You’re injured.”

“Yeah, well, you should see the other guy.” Tony makes a face. “Actually, don’t. I have, and it ain’t pretty.”

***

It takes Jim a month and a lot of promises he’s not sure he’ll be able to keep to get Tony to hand Iron Man—“ _Jaeger!_ ”—over to the military, which all considered was easier than expected. It helps that, with the impending threat of global destruction by way of alien invasion, most active wars have been, for lack of a better term, put on hold. The governments of the world have met and created a worldwide Kaiju-fighting initiative that somebody, somewhere, decided to name SHIELD ( _“Seriously, it doesn’t even stand for anything. Couldn’t they have gone with, I don’t know, Pan Pacific Defense Corps or something? PPDC—Christ, that’s a mouthful, yeah, okay, I guess SHIELD’s fine)_ , which Tony was more willing to hand his creation to than just lone old America.

 

And then there was the question of piloting.

“Nope. Absolutely not.  _I_  made my Jaeger and  _I’m_  piloting it,” Tony says, managing to sound all of four years old while wielding a blowtorch. Jim contemplates whether he should take it away from him, but then his hands were full with a blowtorch of his own.

Already they were at work on the Mark II, but the first one took a little less than a year (Tony started on the Mark I as soon as he heard about Manila) and “military red tape and bureaucracy sucks balls, Rhodey, and not like in a fun way  _God_  how did you deal with this for the past 5 years” so the next one isn’t projected to be ready for another 1.5 years (probably 2, truthfully).

“Tones, come on. We need you working on the Mark II.”

“Well, you’re working on it too, aren’t you?,” gesturing to the plates that Jim was juggling. It was one of Tony’s (many) conditions for lending his tech to the military—“only I can work on my tech… and maybe Rhodey.”

“You’re a resource that needs to be protected.”

“I’m sorry, but I think the safest place in the case of giant alien is  _inside_  the reinforced giant metal suit capable of killing said alien—”

 “…It really, really isn’t,” Jim says, but Tony steamrolls right over him, as he does.

“—and besides, my baby is some really sophisticated machinery. Piloting it requires altogether more finesse than any Air Force guy has.” He catches his breath. “No offense, platypus.”

Jim sighs. “Colonel Williams is our best pilot. I’m sure he’ll figure it out.”

He expects more whining, or maybe threats to take the Jaeger tech away. Instead, he is pinned by Tony’s intense, calculating gaze. He stares right back, challenging.

“ _Fine_. He’s welcome to try, but I’m telling you, only I can pilot Iron Man, so don’t come crying to me when it doesn’t work out, okay?”

“Oh, so it’s Iron Man now, huh?,” Jim asks, finally relaxed. The brass has been hounding him endlessly about, well, everything really, and he’s beyond thankful to have this off his back.

“Oh, shut up,” Tony says and pulls his welding mask back on, full attention on the Mark II, but Jim can tell that he’s smiling.

***

Colonel Williams tries it and fails. So do the next six pilots lined up.

The brass isn’t happy. They want Jim to ask Tony why the hell it isn’t working, and Jim can’t help but think “I told you so” in a voice eerily similar to Tony’s. So he volunteers to try it himself, and the brass is all leery of allowing a lowly second lieutenant with a bad track record with authority to try and pilot a huge powerful weapon, but they’re also very desperate, so they (grudgingly) allow it.

He gets in the cockpit, systems engage, and then he feels like his head has been rolled over by a twelve-wheeler a couple dozen times. Is this how Tony felt, those two hours he faced that Kaiju in California?

The pain subsides a bit, or maybe he just gets used to it. Jim lifts his hand.

Iron Man’s hand follows suit.

 

Jim becomes Iron Man’s pilot. The brass is satisfied and Tony. Well, Jim isn’t quite sure if Tony’s incredibly pleased or incredibly upset about it. He doubts Tony knows himself, which probably answers his question about the pain.

But he lies to anyone who asks, says it’s completely fine, because it’s what needs to be done. None too soon, either, because three days after Jim first gets into Iron Man’s cockpit, the fourth Kaiju attacks.

***

It’s six months and two Kaiju fights later that the nosebleeds start.

Jim discreetly approaches Dr. Hansen, the head research doctor on base, never mind that her specialization is more biochemistry, swearing her to secrecy first. She takes dozens of scans, all of which he sits patiently for (contrary to whatever Dr. Hansen may claim), and—

“It seems like the neural load required to pilot Iron Man is too much for your body to handle. Have you experienced any headaches before, when you pilot?”

Reluctantly, Jim answers. “Yes.”

Dr. Hansen swats his head, which seems to Jim to be counterproductive, if his head was what’s causing all the problems. “Then you should have said. I’d tell you to stop piloting, but that’s not happening, is it?”

She doesn’t even wait for his answer, which would have been a no anyway. She sighs and squints at the readouts on her clipboard. “I can give you some meds to take in the meantime to ward over the worst of the symptoms. I’ll look for a solution to this, don’t worry.”

Jim isn’t worried. He is a soldier, and this is a war for the entire earth. He does what needs to be done.

“I won’t tell the Marshal, but I do need to tell Tony Stark. Oh, don’t look at me like that. I can’t fix this without his help.”

Jim sighs and drops his glare. He was going to find out eventually, anyway. “Fine.”

***

Jim expects. Well. He expects  _some_  reaction from Tony. Worry, probably, or anger for keeping it a secret.

Instead, the next time they see each other down at the workshop, Tony’s just—resigned.

“Dr. Hansen told me about your neural overload.”

Jim narrows his eyes. “You knew this would happen, didn’t you?”

Tony has the audacity to look guilty. “I  _warned_  you—“

“You knew and you still piloted it? Still wanted to pilot it yourself? You were going to get yourself killed!”

Tony gapes at him. “I—you mean— _what?_ ” Then he shakes his head and steps toward Jim dangerously. “No, don’t answer that. How dare you come to me with that when you’re doing the exact same thing.”

Jim stands his ground. “It needs to be done.”

“Exactly!”

“I’m a soldier, Tony. This is my job, not yours.”

“No! You’re my best friend, you’re  _my_  Rhodey, and you’re not dying for this!” Tony’s eyes are red with unshed tears, and his words hit Jim like the recoil of a shotgun.

Tony presses the heels of his palms to his eyes and heaves a sigh. “I’ll fix this, Rhodey. You won’t let me pilot,  _fine_. But I’ll fix this. You’re—you’re not dying because of my goddamn engineering failures.”

Jim pulls him into a hug and smiles, and refuses to let go until he feels Tony relax in his arms.

***

In the end it’s Dr. Hansen—Maya—who figures it out (two months and another Kaiju attack later).

She shows them sketches down in Tony’s workshop. “The schematics are rough. I’m a scientist, not an engineer.”

“Shame,” Tony mutters, and Jim elbows him in the ribs.

“See, we’ve been going about it wrong, trying to lessen the neural load of the Jaeger”—Tony beams at her acknowledgement of the name _—_ “but what if, instead, it can be shared?”

Tony marvels at the science— _“this is beautiful, Maya”_ —and sets about reworking her specs to something viable, buildable, while Maya explains what each spec accomplishes and recalculates other configurations on the fly.

Jim watches it all, silent. “Share the neural load? Won’t that mean sharing everything?”

Tony pauses his frantic scribbling.

Maya looks at them steadily. “Yes. Will that be a problem?”

“Well, what do you think, honeybear?,” Tony says, batting his eyelashes just to be a little shit.

Jim grins back. “No. No, I don’t think it will.”

***

Another Kaiju attacks before they finally finish construction. The nosebleeds come along almost everyday, now, and Jim pretends he doesn’t see the worried looks Tony constantly shoots him while they work. If Jim lets him work later into the night before forcing him to bed, well, nobody says anything about it.

When they show Maya the finished product, she blanches.

“You—you already built it into the Mark II. Without testing.”

Jim shrugs.

“Well, the science is sound, the engineering is sound; what could go wrong?,” Tony says.

Maya buries her face in her hands and mutters something about brilliant engineers tempting fate.

“So, what do you say, Rhodeybear, ready to take our baby for a spin?"

***

They step into the cockpit— _“Conn-Pod,” Tony declares, “you know, for connect, since we’re connecting our—you know what, never mind”_ —together and put on their helmets. Maya boots them up. Distantly, Jim registers a furious Marshal running into the workshop.

Jim braces himself for the pain, but it doesn’t come.

The Drift is—it’s something. Jim sees—his mother smiling, a male British voice, the cockpit of an F-22, the hum of a V12, Tony hungover and wearing Jim’s too-big MIT sweatshirt—

He feels a nudge in his head. Jim looks to his right, and knows his smile is a mirror of Tony’s own.

 

The Mark II steps forward.

**Author's Note:**

> “The media is calling it Iron Patriot, Rhodey. _Iron Patriot._ ”
> 
> “I told you we should have gone all black instead of the red, white, and blue.”
> 
> “But that’s so boring.”
> 
> “We could have been called something cool, like I don’t know, War Machine.”
> 
> A pause.
> 
> “All black for Mark III it is.”


End file.
